A top North Korean decision-making body issued a pointed warning yesterday, saying that nuclear weapons are “the nation’s life” and will not be traded even for “billions of dollars.”

The comments, coming in a statement released after North Korean leader Kim Jong Un presided over a meeting of the central committee of the ruling Workers Party, were made as the United States dispatched F-22 stealth fighter jets to the peninsula to defend Seoul against the increasing threats by the North.

The statement is the latest diplomatic missive amid a series of near-daily threats from Pyongyang in recent weeks, including a vow to launch nuclear strikes on the United States and a warning Saturday that the Korean Peninsula was in a “state of war.”

Pyongyang is angry over annual US-South Korean military drills and a new round of UN sanctions that followed its Feb. 12 nuclear test, the country’s third. Analysts see a full-scale North Korean attack as unlikely, and say the threats are more likely efforts to provoke softer policies toward Pyongyang from a new government in Seoul.

Rep. Peter King (R-LI) likened the North Korean leadership to the Mafia.

“This is not even government,” he told ABC’s “This Week.” “It’s more like an organized-crime family running a territory.”